With the economy suddenly teetering on the brink, the energy concerns that dominated the news two weeks ago suddenly seem quaint. But we’d do well to remember that the effects of the Great Depression flowed not only from the gross errors perpetrated in the market, but from ecological disaster as well. Climate change could be the Dust Bowl of our time.

With this collision of crises in mind, a comparison between oil and wind power is telling.

One of the most hotly contested provisions of the energy bill passed by Congress a couple of weeks ago had to do with easing restrictions on offshore oil exploration to access petroleum deposits off the East Coast. According to a 2006 Department of Interior report, the continental shelf along the east coast between Maine and New Jersey likely contains crude oil reserves equivalent to 27 days’ worth of US consumption.

Contrast this with the capacity of offshore wind along the same coast, as reported by Mark Svenvold in the New York Times Magazine: fully exploited, offshore wind power in the mid-Atlantic states could generate more energy than those states consume from all power sources. The Department of Energy, meanwhile, has estimated that offshore wind nationwide could generate 900,000 megawatts of electricity, more than the 760,000 megawatts that the contiguous United States consumed in 2006.

The contrast is profound. Do we choose offshore drilling rigs with their oil spills and gouts of globe-warming carbon in exchange for a few weeks of oil independence—or offshore wind turbines providing clean, inexhaustibly renewable power? But this isn’t the relevant question. The relevant question is:

Where are the politicians—and ultimately where are the citizens—with the courage to make the all-too-obvious answer a reality?